And 2013 in Slovakia Begins.....

After staying up so late on New Year's Eve, we definitely slept in on New Year's Day.  It was strange to not turn on the TV at all for parades or football games!  We laid low all day, in fact we never left our flat!  It was a relaxing day for sure.  Tim read "The Sacred Acre", which was a Christmas gift from his mom, and I worked on the blog and loading photos from when the kids were here!  :-)   (Have I mentioned that we miss them already??)   

On the 2nd, we were very productive though!!  We headed out for errands in the morning, picking up a package at the post office (we had gotten a little postal pick-up form in our mailbox on the 31st - thanks to cousins Judith and Nancy!!)  We also got a few groceries, looked for a replacement light bulb that burned out, and searched for a sink stopper (we accidentally got the wrong size!)  A biggie for me was having an eyeglass shop fix my glasses - I had lost a screw (no smart-aleck comments, please), and we finally had success in the second shop.  Those all seem like insignificant errands, but it always takes a LOT more time to accomplish simple things, because we just don't know where to look or how to ask questions!  Oh well, we did get most of our "to-do" list done!   :-)

In the afternoon, I addressed all the Christmas card envelopes while Tim cleaned in the flat.  (Not really a fair division of labor I guess!!)  We also made last-minute plans for an overnight trip to Košice, in the eastern part of Slovakia.  It's the second-biggest city in Slovakia and very historic, and everyone says it's a "must-see" destination.  So we read up on the sights to see, checked train schedules, and made a hotel reservation online.  

Jan. 3 we got up and left on a 9:30 a.m. train - not too early!  The trip went well, and when we got to our hotel to ask if we could leave our suitcases prior to check-in time, our room was ready (this was before noon!) so we checked in early.  Super!!  We had packed sandwiches, fruit, and Alana's goodies she brought to us (LOVED the divinity!!), for lunch, so we were all ready to head out sight-seeing for the rest of the day.  

This was our first sight of Košice, on our way from the train station to our hotel.  

It's Jakab Palace, near the park across from the train station.  It's not open to visitors, but beautiful even
just from the street, walking by!  

And then we reached the main square, with St. Elizabeth Cathdral - WOW!!!  

St. Elizabeth Cathedral - the largest in Slovakia, and one of the most impressive Gothic cathedrals
in Europe, according to the guidebooks.  We would agree!!  

The interior is amazing with the Gothic vaulted ceilings.

The Christmas decorations were dwarfed by the height of the pillars and altar.

Alana will be happy to know that we climbed the tower on this cathedral too.   :-)
It was 60 meters high, and the views of the tiled roof were beautiful!  

This is the second, smaller spire of the cathedral, from part-way up the main tower staircase.

Looking down on the park below, with its musical fountains (which we'd love to come back
and see when they are up and running in warmer weather), and beyond to the National Theatre.

It was foggy, but the views of the streets below were still picturesque.  

Going up the spiral staircase, we had access to the bell tower.  I really wanted to ring them,
but we were afraid we might get arrested or banished or something!!   The woman who unlocked the door to the staircase for us only spoke Slovak and French, so we got our description of the tower in French!!
Oh, and BTW Lute, this tower's spiral staircase was much narrower and darker than St. Stephen's in Vienna,
the steps were lots steeper, and they were very worn, so footing was on uneven surfaces.   My shoulders were touching the walls on both sides simultaneously at some points.  The good news was, we were the only ones making the climb! You would have felt very claustrophobic!!

St. Urban's Tower, below in the square.  It was a bell tower that now houses a wax museum. 

Back down on the ground......this is the tower we climbed.  We got to go all the way to the top!  

This is one of several "Bell Trees" in the city parks on the square, which play tunes.
We heard "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas" while we were there!!  :-)

Our walking tour of Košice continued with the beautiful buildings along the square, including the Seminary Church,
farthest on the left of the facing buildings.  

This is the old town hall, again along the main square.

This Baroque sculpture surrounded by statues, is the Plague Column of the Virgin Mary, since she is credited with ending the plague epidemic in the early 1700's.

There were a bunch of wooden huts along one boulevard portion of the square, leftovers of Christmas/New Year's Markets.  We had seen stands selling sweets called Trdelník in Liptovsky Mikuláš and Poprad, but we hadn't tried them.  I read that they are UNESCO protected products typical of Slovakia, so we decided to check it out.   Long strips of a sweet bread-like dough are wrapped around the wooden cylinders (at right) in a spiral, then they are placed in the oven at left to bake.  

The hollow cylinders of baked dough slide off the wooden cylinder, and they are rolled in cinnamon sugar
(or other flavors - chocolate perhaps in the other trays?)  They were literally steaming hot!

The Trdelník far exceeded our expectations!!  YUM YUM YUM!!!  Hot and delicious!!
(Oh and in Tim's other hand is a cup of hot Medovina - a honey/wine beverage of some sort that is offered at about every 3rd stand at the market!!  That helped warm us up on a cold winter day of sight-seeing!!)

This is the sign, so I'd remember what it was we ate.  LOL!!  

This is for Paul and Lute ---- It's Santa Claus made out of Legos!!  :-)

St. Elizabeth's Cathedral on the left, St. Michael chapel on the right.  (It's hard to tell perspective in the photo, but
the chapel is very near the cathedral and much smaller!)

We heard some beautiful music behind the chapel doors, but they were locked.  Boo!
Later, we did get to go inside for a look, just before a mass started.  

One of the quaint, tiny alley-ways off of the street near our hotel.  

A church spire through a gate in an alleyway.  

This building houses the East Slovak Museum, which we toured in the afternoon.  One section was for Natural History (rocks & minerals, birds & animals, etc.), one section was for Slovak culture (furniture, costumes, and other artifacts), and one section was for art through the centuries.  

There was also a special "Bethlehem" exhibit in the museum.

There were dozens of decorated, sparkly palaces, castles, and mansions

Each one had a nativity scene somewhere in the structure with Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jesus.  Some also had other various nativity figures of shepherds, angels, and wise men.  But every one had the Holy Family.

We are still puzzled by this whole exhibit --- was the Baby Jesus ever in a sparkling Slovak
palace???  We'll have to ask for an explanation of this phenomenon!!  :-)

There were some incredibly beautiful pieces of furniture.

We really enjoyed the Slovak history areas!

Some of the beautiful Slovak traditional costumes.

This room was full of neat displays!  It was kind of strange because I think we were the only people in the museum.  The lights were out in most of the rooms, and though a few had motion-activated sensors, most of the time we had to turn the lights on ourselves.  So I'd go into the next room, find the switch on the wall, turn on the lights, and then Tim would turn off the lights in the previous room and join me in the next one.  We figured we should leave it as we found it!  

After the museum closed, we went back to our hotel and used our vouchers for a free glass of wine at their bar.
Evidently Košice is in a prolific wine producing region, and this was very good.

We went out for a walk to a traditional Slovak restaurant, and it was snowing gently!
This is the Calvinist church down at the end of the street.  

The restaurant was decorated in many cute knick-knacks, and it was absolutely charming!  We got to watch the
beautiful snowfall out the window during dinner.  We had white wine this time,  and it was also great! 

We had a romantic walk back after dinner, through the real snowflakes falling, and under the snowflake lights above, with the Christmas tree in the square in the distance.  Some of the Christmas Market stands were even open.  

And that's it for Day #1 in Košice!   Tune in tomorrow for the next installment on Eastern Slovakia's largest city!   :-)